Empath has shared a video for their new song “Passing Stranger.” It’s the latest single from their forthcoming LP Visitor, due out next month. Check out the video for “Passing Stranger”—shot by Halle Ballard in Empath member Catherine Elicson’s apartment—below.
Empath’s last LP was 2019’s Active Listening: Night on Earth. In November, Empath shared a video for “Diamond Eyelids,” the first single from Visitor. That track had first appeared as a b-side for the loose single “Born 100 Times.”
Of the new single, Elicson said in a statement:
“The beat was inspired by druggy Velvet Underground drums, on top of which Randall began improvising a heavy tremolo on his synth. One of the slowest songs we’ve ever written without an abrasive moment. We finally got to do a fade out. This song was written in a similar way to ‘Diamond Eyelids’ i.e. collaging together memories. This time I pieced together different memories from my childhood, some idyllic, some difficult, but as if it were a story about someone else returning to their hometown. The melody of this song was actually in a really old iPhone voice memo that I had made and forgot about. When I re-listened to it after a year or so, I was like damn this is catchy I gotta finish writing this one. I also wanted a song where I could bust out my sweep picking in a non-cringe way. I hope to be considered at the vanguard of sweep picking in pop music, thank you.”
Read Pitchfork’s “Rising” feature “Meet Empath, Four Friends Who Make Noise Rock That’s as Healing as It Is Brutal.”
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